The weather has gone against me in the last month, this combined with poor lighting in the evenings, constant rain & due to the fact that most work is restricted to Saturdays, progress has been slow.
Plate ready to take winch
The winch/pulley arrangement to raise the mast sections from horizontal to vertical was first done with 12mm nylon rope, this helped us overcome obstructions, 2 pulleys were secured between lugs welded on the stem post, the rope was taken from the winch through one of these, up to a pulley at the base of the mast, back down to another pulley and up to a lug at the base of the mast
The winch wire rope (6mm) was first to be fixed, this worked very well with no problems enabling the mast to be raised vertical (see sketch below)
This image shows the first 2 sections lifted to a respectable height, note the poor condition of my main aerials due to strong winds recently. Photo taken at dusk
When we inserted the 3rd section and set it up there was a snag, it caught in the 2nd section as we raised the mast, a problem to be solved another time
Below you can see the 3 sections at about 50 feet, 1/12/02
The rotator cage was started one night during the week, the top & bottom were cut to size and the vertical bars cut to length
It has been a terrible windy day & I nearly lost the pole bolted on the back of the house, I dropped it to ground level about 30 feet lower, you can see the difference in the 5th & 2nd last images, again lighting conditions were bad and a full gale is blowing. The stabilizers are doing a good job with little movement at 50 feet
When the 2nd section is being raised, it takes the 3rd section up with it, this seems to work very well, thanks Paraic